Seeing Double

IN A RAMSHACKLE HOTEL, beneath a tattered counterpane, a genius languishes. Rejected by Radcliffe at the age of 20 and by her family and friends at the age of 40. Mary McLane, and author who once published a scandalous memoir lies dying. Played by both a young and an old actress, she simultaneously cries out for affirmation of her past accomplishments and bleeds with the desire for future success.

In My Hand. A Stone is an original play of the "Portrait of the Artist" genre, in which the ambition of the heroine to succeed as an artist is tied up inextricably with the ambition of the play to succeed as a work of art Playwright Gloria Parkinson '83, who came to Harvard to complete her education after years of writing directing and acting in British stage and radio has centered the play's action on the device of having two actresses play Mary--one at 19, one at 40. The character views her memories, fears and deferred dreams from both perspectives. The success of the play rests almost entirely on this innovative structure, since all of the other characters function essentially as two dimensional background. And the central actresses do not always seem able to shoulder such a burden.

The Agassiz Theater, with its Victorian decor and its Radcliffe affiliation, is the perfect setting for Dudley House's production it conjures up the very turn-of-the century female identity that gives rise to both Mary McLane's artistic uniqueness and her despair. Donna Staephansky as the dying, 40-year-old Mary succeeds in dominating the play from her sickbed her haggard face showing the marks of unfulfilled expectation. Her raspy voiced stubborness and eccentricity keep her alive as a character and avoid the danger of letting the role wallow in bitterness and cynicism.

The first few scenes, in which the audience has come to an understanding with the middle-aged Mary build up expectations of the 19-year-old Mary which the younger actress does not quite live up to. Self-centered and enraptured with her tender age and with her talent the younger Mary known as May, strides onto the stage and unabashedly declares she is a genius. But Knice Stetson a B.U. undergraduate plays the part with a too-subdued vivacity.

Stetson's sidelong Lady Di glances are engaging and coy, but she does not convey the flamboyance one might expect of a woman who finds the need to publish her memoirs at age 19. At times her voice leaves the realm of the play to rise to a higher level of detachment, like a narrator on her own life.

The play unfolds as a series of unconnected tableaux, almost like a poetry reading, which chronicle the important events in Mary's life, such as the publication of her book and her rift with her family. In these vignettes, the two Mary's serve as foils to each other. May's idealism rebounding off Mary's deathbed cynicism. The other characters--her father, a publisher, a beau--move on and off the stage with an case oblivious to the tension between the two main characters. Like figures in a tableau they never break into the third dimension.

When a publisher offers to publish her book on the condition that she change the title from I Await the Devil's Coming to My Story Mary McLane. May readily acquiesces while Mary rages in the background. If she could do it over again, she insists she would refuse to tailor her work to the mores of turn-of-the-century-America. Despite the title change as it turns out society ostracizes Mary who never succeeds in producing another work.

A song and dance sequence in the mostly unnecessary second act breaks up the repetition of these stationary tableaux. May's dance with the Devil and her bawdy-voiced burlesque manage to supply the flamboyance that the actress lacks.

As the play progresses and Mary becomes reconciled to her fate the two characters begin to merge. The final scene moves away from Mary's bitterness and rebellion, back to passive indifference which mirrors the world's. No longer famous or even notorious, McLane, like the historical character on whom she is based, dies in obscurity Orange lighting bathes the set there are no more choked back tears of rage or regret, but a dull feeling of acceptance at the death of a genius.